Almost Lost You
by Fertummelt of the Mind
Summary: Sarek and Amanda try, they really do. A child would be perfect. But after the third attempt, you give up hope. Fetal death - maybe just implied if you wish M for death. I truly don't know where to put this since it's not TOS or reboot, technically.
1. The First Time

A project I did on miscarriages led to this for Amanda and Sarek.

You've been warned: FETAL DEATHS.

Each chapter gets longer, I promise. Call it a mini-project of mine.

- - -

_The First Time_: The poisoned words hit Amanda's heart dead on. Bull's-eye. "I… But- He was healthy… So healthy." And that's when the tears begin to fall. She gasps and rocks slowly on the medical table despite the discomfort of the blood that's drying between her thighs. The Vulcan doctor simply stares, rather stoically, at the pained woman before turning to the computer and typing in the final diagnosis for her husband. 'Miscarriage. Reason(s): incompatibility with female's body.' And then he gives her a reluctant bow as he exits the examination room. "But you were so healthy… You kicked Mommy in her sleep. You…," she sobbed. The thoughts she had conjured when she first missed her menstrual cycle and found out she was expecting came to mind yet again but this time, instead of the warm bundle of joy in her arms, it was a sickly gray fetus, hardly bigger than a grapefruit from Earth. "Oh, dear God…" The images grow into horrific scenes and she hardly has the ability to stop the flow. She doesn't register the door's _whoosh _as it opens, nor does she register the tall figure that glances from her to the screen and back. But when a warm hand rests on her own, located currently at her cramping stomach, she looks up with teary eyes and leaps forward, wrapping herself around Sarek.

"Wife, I have received the news."

"But, Sarek, he was fine! He was healthy and perfect and- and-." Her words break into sobs as she nuzzles into his chest. And he is silent.

No, not even her years on Vulcan could have prepared her emotional to endure the pain she feels.

- - -


	2. The Unexpected Time

_The Unexpected Time_: Amanda looks hopefully at the doctor from her position on the examination bed. Although the last encounter she had with babies still haunts the deeper depths of her mind, she can't help the way her heart swells as she thinks of a small daughter playing in a bright white sundress. Her hand glides over the painful bulge of her stomach and she flashes a small smile at the physician.

"Lady Amanda, you have miscarried."

No comforting words or sorrowful tone to soften the blow. She's grown to expect that but even now she wishes she could have a sympathetic, maybe outwardly feeling doctor to deliver the news. Wait. The news.

"A… Another miscarriage?" she gasps. Her lungs feel like that ultrasound gel is being pumped into them instead of oxygen. Tears well up. "But- I'm fine. There was no blood or cramps this time! How could I've miscarried?" She is shouting now, angry and distraught. "My heart faltered and that's why we were concerned for the baby."

"It would seem that the discomfort in your upper abdomen was the miscarriage. You have not hemorrhaged yet because your uterus has not registered the incident. The fetus expired due to asphyxiation; the umbilical cord formed around it's neck."

Amanda hardly hears a word. She doesn't want to hear them. She wants her child back. She wants the strange comfort Sarek's arms offer. "Please. Get my husband." It's all she can manage. The doctor rises, nods tersely, and leaves. And as the silence blankets her, Amanda turns over to her side curls up, bringing her knees to her chest and burying her face in her hands. The warmth that is suddenly against her back is welcome; she feels too cold inside and out.

"Sarek… I'm sorry," she murmurs. It hurts to breathe, not to mention talking and she winces at the ache in her lungs.

"Amanda, you have no need to apologize." Although Sarek never truly 'shows' emotion, he forces as much as he is allowed, or capable of, into those words, reassuring her she isn't alone in this hurt and that it isn't her fault.

- - -


	3. The Heartshattering Time

_The Heart-shattering Time_: 'There is no way I'm going to lose this one' she had said the day the news was brought to her attention. 'And no way I'm telling Sarek.' And she had managed to keep that up. The child is still lodged in her six weeks later and Sarek is still oblivious. Or, at least, he seems so. But Amanda doesn't dwell on that. She strains to act normal, not happy and anxious though that's what she feels. "Sarek, I have to go but I'll see you when you get home. Love you." A kiss to the screen and a sprint to the door and she is practically flying towards the clinic.

Half an hour later, Amanda is lying on her back, legs spread open, and gel for the ultrasound, which she thought to be a little old-fashioned but the Vulcans naturally updated the technology to give one a better picture of what's cooking inside, once again smeared across her slightly rounded stomach. The doctor comes back into the main room, his eyes skimming the padd with what has to be the most un-entertained expression she has ever seen, even for a Vulcan.

"A repeat performance is hardly worth the time. You have miscarried. It seems that there is a tear in your uterus' lining and it filled with blood. It crushed the placenta." He looks up to gaze at the woman before setting the padd on the edge of the bed she lay on. Silence is his only answer and he doesn't mind as he turns back to the database to input the information. "We've contacted your spouse. He shall be here momentarily."

"Sarek's coming? Please, don't let him in. I- Please," she moans, throwing her head into the pillow to muffle her protests. She'd rather not see her husband again. She feels the guilt herself and having his added would just kill her.

"Amanda?" That voice. Damn.

"Go away," she whines. "You're not wanted here."

Sarek sits beside her, almost level with her knees, and puts a hand to her shoulder. "Why do you reject me, wife? Why did you not inform me of your pregnancy?"

Amanda rolls over to look at him. "I thought you'd hate me if… this happened again. There must be something wrong with me. I just…"

A kiss to her nose shocks her momentarily out of her pain before it seeps back in. Her tears hit full force and she curls up to her husband's waiting arms. Her chest feels tight and her heart feels broken.

Maybe it is broken. Maybe the baby broke her insides. And maybe she's never meant to really conceive.

"Do not think that," he says gruffly, slowly rubbing her back. He had learned from his years on Earth that even Amanda needed the emotional support when things went wrong.

"Sarek, it's been months now and I'm still looking like a whale," Amanda complains, twisting sideways to see the mound of her stomach in the mirror. "And my back hurts like the dickens." Taken back by her use of the twentieth century phrase, Sarek looks up from his meal and stares at her questioningly.

"I see nothing wrong with your shape. You look Human."

She shoots him a dark look before pouting at her reflection. "Oh, hush. I've gained weight since our last attempt but I've been eating like I have since arriving on Vulcan. I don't get it. I should've lost the fat by now." A jump to prove it with the jiggle of her abdomen and she sits on the edge of the counter.

"Your weight is nothing to complain about. You are still in acceptable health," he points out before turning his attention back to his food.

"Sarek, for being ambassador to Earth, you sure don't know much about the mass of Earth women." A pointed glance her way causes giggles to erupt and an annoyed husband to leave the room, swiping his dish into the replicator for cleaning. Amanda sighs, knowing she'll have to apologize later for her rude comment, however true it may have been. She hops down from the counter and slowly walks to the balcony. "I wonder if the showers have started yet." And as she steps out onto the blanched stone, she sees the rain clouds hanging low on the rocks about a mile ahead.

"They have not started but they will shortly," a voice murmurs from the other side of the balcony.

"Hm." She doesn't really want to talk anymore, just sleep. She feels as if she hasn't slept in days though she slept in for almost an hour today and nearly two the day before. A sharp pain elicits a strangled gasp from the woman as she crumples to her knees. She throws her hand to her hip, the location of the extraordinary ache, as she searches for Sarek until she notices he's beside her, holding her up and trying to talk to her but she can't hear. It's like cotton has been wedge in her ears and everything becomes fuzzy, her hearing even more so, her sight, and then it becomes black.

She awakens in a small hospital bed, a monitor's steady beeping being the culprit that cut her slumber short.

"Sarek?" she calls out. A rustle of fabric and a gruff 'yes' tells her he's there with her. "What happened?"

"You fell unconscious on the balcony of our home after your pelvis fractured." Without going any further into detail, he sits down at her knee and begins a light stroke of her stomach through the blanket.

"How did I do that? Crack my pelvis, I mean," Amanda asks, trying to lift her head but it hurts to much.

"The fetus went into distress and fractured your hip."

"What?" the woman gaped. "There was a… How? What happened?" She sits up, ignoring the sharp pain in her head and hip, pulling Sarek closer.

"It appeared that a fetus broke through your uterus' wall and that killed its twin. The placenta attached to your bladder and managed to live for a few months. As you jumped, the placenta began to detach. The fetus went into distress and struck your hip. The doctors removed the fetus though they had to leave the placenta connected to your bladder."

"Did the fetus live? Is it okay?"

Sarek peers at her for a moment before he nods once. "It is currently on life support until its lungs fully develop. Would you care to see?"

"Oh, dear… yes," Amanda nearly sobs as she throws the blanket back and wobbles out of bed. And from there, her husband leads her to the small plastic bubble on the table across the room. Inside, there's a very small, sick-looking baby with several tubes plugged in several places that connected to several machines outside of the protective case. He's about the size of her fist, the color of a seasick sailor she had seen in paintings, with black tufts of hair covering his body. It's all too overwhelming. "I thought I had lost you," she whispers, "I thought I wouldn't get you." She kneels so that she is level with her child as tears of too many emotions to pinpoint fall down to her hospital gown.

"I have decided a name for him but I thought it best to ask for you opinion first. 'Spock'."

"Spock."

- - -


End file.
